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Wednesday, 17 March 2010

Cyclists

There's a lot of bollocks that the government puts on adverts on TV that assumes we all agree that we are a nation of lazy, fat bums who should be drinking less, driving less, not drinking and driving at all, and eating a whole lot of vegetables (five portions a day... I don't think I even eat five portions of food a day going by what they reckon a portion is, either - the L and the T in your BLT apparently don't even count).

Most people just ignore all this bullshit. Some even say, hey, stop worrying about my potassium levels and sort out the economy, you fuckpigs. Other people buy it. And these people love to use their fervent adherence to these pony and trap principles as another reason to be smug to a level previously only achieved by people looking for a second home on bastarding Escape to the bastarding Country.

These people are better than you. They actually like the taste of smoothies (and not even as a mixer) and genuinely prefer wholemeal bread (the bread that tastes stale even when you first buy it and sucks all the moisture out of your mouth as you chew). They don't leave their appliances in standby mode. They do that insane thing you're supposed to do of washing the rubbish before you put it in the recycling thing. They care.

And how do these hateful bastards get to work? That's right, they cycle.

Cycling is great when you're a kid, you can go wherever you want, or at least you could when I was a kid before that massive influx of paedophiles that took place at some point in the nineties. It was great because it gave you some freedom, it gave you a taste of what it was going to be like in another 8 years or so when you could get a car.

So now you're an adult. You can have all the cars you want, big, bastard cars with big fuck off engines that sound awesome, and you could sit there in air conditioned comfort playing some tunes, drinking some coffee. You could arrive at work looking basically the same as you did when you set off, and you could crack straight on.

But rather than do that, instead you are going to don a ridiculous luminous outfit that is so tight it allows people to see what religion you are, a special needs "I might hurt myself" looking helmet, and in London, quite often, a fucking gas mask. You are then going to physically exert youself in whatever conditions British weather has thrown at you (usually drizzle), arriving at the office with your hair plastered to your face is a sweaty, helmety mess. You have to have a shower and get ready for work actually at the office? That's weird. Trouble at home, is there, mate? She kicked you out again? Oh no, my mistake, you're just doing that asshole cycling to work thing.

She fucking should kick you out.

Yes, I can see that it's a good way to get your government recommended amount of daily exercise, but you can do that in a gym without annoying everyone on the road and at your work, and you can watch Eastenders there while you're doing it and you never have to wear a gas mask or a special needs helmet. Plus everyone else there is dressed like that so nobody is laughing at you. It's a lot more fucking civilised. And when you get bored of cycling, because it is really bloody boring, there's other shit you can do there too! Plus, being a gym goer, well, there's loads of potential for smugness there. You'd enjoy that.

There is a lot of this tedious shit going on in the UK, but Jesus wept, have you seen Holland? They have taken it to whole new psychotic levels over there. I guess because it's flat it is a) easier to cycle and b) more scary for them if global warming kicks off to the levels described in the Daily Mail.

Remember that god awful song by Katie Melua about "9 Million Bicycles in Beijing"? You know the one, not that other one with the equally weird lyrics that went "If you were a piece of wood I'd nail you" and all that shit, though it did basically have the same tune as that one. Yeah, well there are 9 million bicycles chained together outside every single station in Holland. How anyone finds the bike of their very own I have no idea, but unlike over here all the bikes look really, really shit, like they were dug up on fucking Time Team, so maybe you just take any old one.

Cyclists rule the roads over there, and for some reason I am more worried about being hit by a cyclist than by a car (I reckon it'd be nasty, getting all tangled up its spokes and all those poky metal bits going at your ribs), so this freaks the granny out of me, especially if I'm already feeling a bit freaked out which seems to happen in Holland a fair bit.

You might think it would be cool if this country was a bit more like Holland, but if the trade off for legalised drugs and hilarious red light districts was having to live off of ham sandwiches (honestly, that's all there is) and ride a rusty penny farthing everywhere then fuck it, let's stay as we are.